Present day educational technology such as computer and online grade books are used to organize information, store data and perform calculations about student learning. These often include places to enter educational standards and assignments such as homework, tests, and quizzes. Some report mastery of standards while others report using the more traditional A-F scale. Regardless, these systems all have one thing in common; they are used to report student learning in terms of student mastery. Student mastery can be thought of as a measurement of the level to which a student has attained the knowledge, reasoning and skills expected.
While mastery information can be beneficial, it is limited in a number of ways, including that it often fails to meaningfully reflect or measure student growth. In the current state of the art, even when individuals decide they want to measure student growth, there is no available technology that can be used to define growth targets, compute and report student growth over time, or using that information to provide meaningful feedback. Accordingly, there is a need in the art for technology which can be used in defining, tracking, and analyzing growth.